Past, Present and Future
by shaneequa
Summary: The Winter Solider is back and forces Natasha to make a choice between her past, present and future.
1. Reunited

Title: Past, Present and Future  
Author: Shaneequa  
Rating: T for the language  
Disclaimer: I don't own Marvel or any of its characters.  
Summary: The Winter Soldier is back and forces Natasha make a choice between her past, her present and her future.  
Author's Notes: So I promised myself that I would start to write this after my midterms. This story is basically finished since I wrote it last summer in response to Black Widow _rumored_ on Capt America 2... and now that it's announced that she is, well I thought I'd give Clintasha shippers something with Bucky and Natasha.

I would love feedback on this since I know NOTHING about the Winter Solider!

Don't worry guys, I'm a Clintasha shipper, so please just stick with me through the WinterWidow stuff.

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Chapter 1

"Hill, get me Romanoff," Fury order, his eye never leaving the man on the other side of the glass partition.

Winter Soldier, they called him. He was actually Bucky Barnes, Steve Rogers' best friend who the Soviets had turned into a killing machine. Why he turned up at SHEILD asking to defect was a question Nick Fury couldn't figure out the answer to. He was Russia's best, and although on the surface, Russia and the United States were no longer at war as they had in the Cold War, the Winter Soldier served Russia's former allies such as China and North Korea.

The door opened to the observation room.

"Sir you called for me," Natasha announced walking into the room. Fury turned his head motioning for her to stand next to him then turned his focus back to the perfectly composed half-man half-whatever-the-hell-this-man-was.

Natasha stood next to Fury, her breath hitching the only sign that she recognized the man behind the mirror.

The man who seemed to sense her presence and looked up at her direction, looking her straight in the eye.

"What would you like me to do, sir?" Natasha asked knowing why she was called in. She was, after all, the expert in Russian operatives and if there was a Russia operative she was an expert on, it would have to be her former lover-mentor-foe, the Winter Solider.

"He's offering information on the current Red Room and underground KGB ops," Fury stated. "I need you to find out why he's suddenly wanted to defect."

Natasha walked to the door, nodding, the mission and a plan to interrogate the man in the other room already spinning in her mind.

"Romanoff."

"Sir?"

"I don't trust him."

"Yes sir," Natasha said before closing the door behind her and walking into the other room as if she belonged there.

She took the chair at the corner of the room and placed it on the other side of the steel metal desk that the Winter Soldier was sitting at. Inwardly, she rolled her eyes at SHEILDs interrogation room, for how stereotypical it was for such a covert agency.

"We both know that if you hadn't wanted to be here, you could've broken out of this door, killed the men guarding it and jumped off to your freedom," Natasha opened looking Bucky in the eye, her eyes flickering to his robotic arm. She switched her dialect to Russian, her native tongue rolling easily out of her mouth. "So tell me, why are you here?"

"It's true then," he replied with a smirk. "The Room's greatest creation, defecting to work for the one country she was raised to despise."

"I don't work for anybody," Natasha spat.

"Funnily enough, you have a SHIELD uniform on, is this cover for you Natalia?"

"If it was, wouldn't you know? You were higher up in the ranks than me, no matter what I did. They always favored you more. The man who they saved from the ice, revived to do exactly the opposite of what you had meant to when you joined the battle. Now you're back."

"Saw Steve on the news," he replied shutting his eyes for a second. "I- you remember how it felt. When you got memories of your past. When all of the sudden you start to remember who you were before they took you."

"No, I don't," Natasha replied angrily. "You took me from my family when I was five. You killed them before I could know who they were, what they were like -"

"No, Natalia. You remembered them. When you first came, you had these... The most vivid imagination about your father coming to your rescue. Your mother's cooking and her ballet... You remember don't you?"

"What are you playing at, Barnes? What the hell are you doing here?"

"I just want a new start. My ledger, it drips more red than yours could ever reach," he admitted. "I want my best friend back."

"And how do we know you're not doing this for _them_," Natasha asked him looking into the eyes that never in her experience had been able to lie to her. She hoped that she could still rely on that.

He chuckled. "You think that they even remotely care about this place when you've made enemies of beings bigger than yourself? No. They don't care anymore; think this organization is as good as dead after Battle of Manhattan. I'm here for a new start."

Natasha looked at him. Orders being spat out at her as she analyzed the man in front of her. With a slight nod in agreement she sighed, looking her former lover-mentor-partner in the eye once again.

"Your training starts in 18 hours," Natasha said walking towards the door. "Rest up now."

The Winter Solider nodded his head, a small smile on his face.

"I've missed you, Natalia."

Natasha shut the door with a click.

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Reviews please? (pretty please?)


	2. Partners

All the mistakes on here are mine, I tried taking them of before posting but the only time that I have to post is right now while my eyes are dilated... So please bear with me if you see errors.

Clintasha interaction in this chapter!

Update: I went back and fixed the errors I could find and made this chapter a little longer! I didn't realize how short it was until today.

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Chapter 2

Clint watched their surroundings through the scope of his M-4 on an old building in the middle of Hong Kong. They had just finished their mission: in, kill the bastard who was trafficking children, out.

Their mission objectives called for three days, but it lasted for about a week and a half because Natasha couldn't gather enough intel from the streets in order to get the time that imports and exports were happening. Something that usually was a piece of cake to her.

Throughout the whole mission, Natasha seemed distracted. He had never seen her like that in the almost ten years that they have been working together. She was detached and sometimes she would wake up not knowing what was going on around her. It was almost like the Natalia Romanova that he rescued from drowning in the blood of her ledger. Except it was different this time, this time Clint didn't know who she was running from and why she was reverting back to her old coping mechanisms.

Well he had an inkling, and he hoped to God he was wrong.

Clint turned back to Natasha who was packing up their belongings around the room while clearing the room of fingerprints and any evidence that they were there at all.

Just some standard post-op procedures that they usually did in comfortable silence after the mission was completed. Except this time, at least to Clint, he could cut the silence with a spork, never mind a knife.

"You ok, Nat?" Clint asked her sitting on the bed. He grabbed her fidgeting hands and pulled her down on the space next to him. "You've seemed kind off lately."

"I'm fine, Clint," Natasha dismissed him making a motion to stand up. Clint pulled her back down to him.

"Seriously, Natasha. What's going on? You've been distracted this op, you're never distracted."

"I can have one bad op, Barton," Natasha replied curtly. "Give it up."

Clint shook his head. "I won't. I care about you, you almost got yourself killed out there. What would I do then? I just broke you in."

"Funny, Barton."

"Does this have anything to do with Cap's old friend coming back from Russia? The Winter Solider or whatever the hell he's named?"

Natasha looked up at him nodding her head. There was no purpose in lying to Clint. For almost a decade he had been her partner and was there when she went through the phases of her defection to the United States. He knew her well enough to know when she was lying, sad or happy without her outwardly showing it. It was one of the reasons why they worked so well together.

At the moment though, it was one of the reasons why she had withdrawn to herself.

She was just barely figuring out emotions. Figuring out what happiness, sadness and fear meant to her and how she could control it and channel it to strengthen her. After all, that was what she did as the Black Widow, even her weaknesses were strengths. James "Bucky" Barnes coming back threw her emotions into a tailspin. The longer she would spend time with him, the more she would remember and feel what it was like to be fourteen, learning and killing for the first time on her own. This was right before she was assigned the code name of Black Widow.

At times, she would think that Alexei wasn't the reason for her name, but the man who she had loved with her all, and didn't love her back.

"You knew him in the Room?" Clint asked breaking her train of thought.

Natasha nodded her head once again in reply.

"He trained me."

"It was more than that though, wasn't it," Clint stated more than asked.

"He... I was only fourteen at that time," Natasha started. "I... I pursued him. He was bigger than life to me. He was in the war, he fought Hydra. He was my teacher and I was... I was infatuated."

"You were in love with him."

"I used the skills that they taught me. To seduce. To get him to want me too. I just... I fell in love and he didn't and..."

Clint placed a hand on her knee. "You don't have to continue, Nat."

"I told him that I fell in love with him. He told me that love is for children."

"Love isn't..."

"I know that, I just..." Natasha cut him off, looking down at her hands on her lap. "Thing is Clint, it's like I'm fourteen again. I'm a child, for him."

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Reviews please?

Comments and Criticisms, welcome!

Hope you guys like the last minute additions!


	3. Confidant

So to start off, I'm not really feeling this chapter, it's a filler chapter.

I promise the story gets better (just finished writing it!)... So let me know what you think! It's never too late to change stuff up in the chapters I've already written.

Happy reading!

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Chapter 3

She was beautiful. Though he always thought that she was although bloodied and bruised, that she was one of the most beautiful things he has ever seen in his life; only comparable to sunrises over the mountains and oceans or a chicks first flight.

Clint had not seen Natasha since a week after their last mission where she all but professed her love for the bionic man who was going through his defection phases at SHIELD. He needed to put some space between them, and he had done so by going up to Maria Hill and asking for back to back solo missions, his reason: to ensure that he was back to himself and competent enough after being compromised with the whole Loki stint.

Maria had willingly obliged his request knowing that the archer wouldn't ask for no reason. For the last six months, he has been away doing two week stint missions that were easy enough for someone of his particular skill set. The few times he was back in the Avenger Tower, he made sure to spend some time with Tony who had been feeling lonely with Bruce had gone back to India for humanitarian efforts and Rogers busy with the return of his old friend.

Tony had been curious as to why he was taking missions without the Black Widow, but he explained that as the Winter Soldier's handler, Natasha was required to oversee the progress he was going through as he defected to the United States. It was an excuse and Tony knew it, but he accepted it.

After all, everyone knew the truth about why he was avoiding her at all costs.

Everyone but her.

Tonight, she was especially beautiful in her olive colored gown that left the back open and exposed her pale skin. His fingers itched to place his hands there and feel her smooth skin as he had done countless times before.

She had gone up to him, all smiles, a bionic arm around her waist as they both greeted him. Welcomed him back after half a year away. He could spot the changes between the two, how they whispered in each other's ear and invaded each other's personal space.

Currently, the two were down in the dance floor and he was up at the bar drowning sorrows that he knew he shouldn't have.

"Barton," Bruce greeted him walking up to where he was standing at the bar, a perfect view of the dance floor and its dancers in front of them.

"Doctor," Clint greeted back.

Bruce shook his head. "It's just Bruce."

"Well in that case, Clint."

They've only worked together twice since the Avengers had been formed together on that faithful day in New York City. Since then the good Doctor has been doing Pro-Bono around Asia and South America after the series of natural disasters that hit the world.

"You don't look like you're enjoying the party," Bruce noted observing the archer's body language and form.

"I don't enjoy being in a suit."

Bruce shook his head, "it's more than that."

"Look Doc-Bruce, if I needed a psych eval, I'd go to SHIELD and get one."

Bruce nodded focusing instead on the drink that's in front of him. HE watched Tony and Pepper down on the dance floor. This was, after all, the couple's engagement party, which had turned into an impromptu wedding party with Tony's spontaneity.

"They seem happy," Bruce stated a motioning towards the couple on the dance floor.

Clint nodded in agreement. "Yeah, they do."

"Are you going down there to join them?" Bruce asked him. "The blonde over there is trying to get your attention."

Clint shook his head avoiding the direction of the blonde that Bruce pointed out. "I don't dance. That's Natasha's thing."

Natasha. He no longer referred to her as "Nat" or "Tasha" just like he had since he brought her in to SHIELD. She was now strictly Natasha or Agent Romanoff. Not that he talked to her or about her to anybody. But when he's sitting on the rooftop of a building, with nothing to do but look through his scope, he would think of her. Their adventures together. And in those hours, she would no longer be "Nat" or "Tasha," but Natasha.

"Right, Agent Romanoff," Bruce said using her proper name. He was never told to call her Natasha, so he just simply hadn't started. Unlike Tony, Bruce liked all his appendages where they were. "She certainly knows how to dance."

Clint nodded his head finishing his drink off. "It's her job."

"Is babysitting the Winter- Barnes a part of that job?"

"I wouldn't know," Clint shrugged. "Not her partner anymore."

Bruce looked at Clint surprise on his features. He turned to Clint with one eyebrow raised.

"Fury split up his best team?"

"I asked for them to be partnered," Clint admitted. "They would work well together."

"You're just going to push her into his arms?"

"It's where she's always been."

"Why don't you just tell her how you feel?"

Bruce and the rest of the team had figured when they met the two assassins formally after the battle that the two were an item. After a few months of observation, and Tony starting up a betting pool in which they all were secretly a part of, they found out that the two were in fact unattached to each other. They were partners and best friends, but the underlying tension and desire was evident to anyone who glanced at the two.

After convincing Tony, and getting Pepper into the argument, they all agreed to just leave the two alone because they would eventually work it out.

It turns out they were all wrong.

"It doesn't matter," Clint stated motioning for the bartender to come over ordering another drink. "She, out everyone in this world, deserves to be happy. She's happy with him. I don't want to get in the way."

"In the way of what?" Bruce questioned. "Tony told me to talk to you about this. You haven't gone on missions with her. You haven't been yourself lately, we're all just worried."

"You have nothing to worry about. It's just taking me more time than i thought it would."

"For what?"

"To get over her."

The bartended served Clint his drink, as well as an Appletini. He excused himself from Bruce with a short nod over at the blonde's direction carrying his drink.

Bruce lifted his glass at a toast to the archer. Barton needed all the luck he could get.

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Reviews please?

Comments and Criticisms, welcome!


	4. Evolution

The action and excitement begins! Eeep!

I hope you guys like this chapter. Like I said, already done with writing this story. Also in the process of finishing the outline for the Natasha-as-Anatasia-Clint-as-Dmitri-story so look for that sometime after I finish this (let me know if you're interested in reading it!)

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Chapter 4

"Natalia," Bucky called out from in front of Natasha as he checked the scope. It has his turn to have surveillance for the next eight hours while Natasha gets some shut eye.

Natasha ignored the man behind her. She hated that name, _Natalia_. It reminded her of old times, when she was a cold blooded killer. When she would kill in the name of killing and added red in her ledger.

Most of all, she didn't like the flood of memories that she got when he called her Natasha. The way her hands twitched to kill on order like she had before they took the brainwashing that she had received in the Red Room and replaced it with another brain wash, except she trusted this one, she wasn't forced to do this one.

She had her back to Bucky. Trusted him enough that he wouldn't put a knife or a bullet through her back. She calculated every entrance way; doorway, window, ventilation system. Thought about the engineering behind the room and construction of materials before acknowledged that she can close her eyes and put her guard down, just for a few hours.

Her hand still clutching her gun.

Clint was on extended leave. Three weeks, Fury had given him after the running total of eight months that he was out on missions. SHIELD was logical in the way that they didn't want their agents to burn out. They had rotation shifts, every six months. On call classification changes every four weeks.

This was the longest stretch he's had without seeing Natasha since he met her. He thought of her often. When he would pass by a street blending into the New York City crowd in his casual jeans and hoodie and seeing a sign. A lamp. Anything really.

He was determined to forget her, and whatever memories that New York City would dredge up.

In fact, since he was going in his fourth day he knew that he had to be on leave for a little while longer. Maybe ten more days or so before he could even think about the possibilities of going up to Fury and asking for some time back. He didn't need the three weeks. He had no family, no lover, he had no purpose of having time off.

Deciding to stay out of the city, and state really and drive up to Canada for a while where he could clear his head, Clint walked towards the garage where he parked his '65 'Vette at.

Clint's phone rang, Stark's ring tone.

"Stark?"

"Barton, Buddy!" Stark greeted, his usual sarcastic tone.

Clint rolled his eyes. Sometimes he didn't know what he was doing with these people. "What do you want, Stark?"

"Nothing, I know you have some time off," Stark laughed. "Hacked the _unbelievably_ easy database. You have to talk to Fury about that. Wouldn't want this information to go to out to other people."

"What do you want, Stark?"

"Pepper has this friend," Stark started. Clint groaned into the phone. Since his wedding, Stark's mission had been to set his single friends up in the quest to get them to settle down like he has. Tony Stark didn't have a lot of people he could call friends. There was Rodney, Clint and Bruce. There was Rogers and Natasha. Then there was Jarvis, but he couldn't really set the computer up with someone so Stark has been working on a female AI much to everyone's amusement.

"Stark, I told you," Clint stated. "I don't need your help picking up women."

"Pepper and I just don't want you to be lonely."

"I'm not lonely."

Clint walked up to the garage door that held his car, using his key to open the door before stepping in.

"You don't have to hide it from us," Start responded with a sigh. "I'm putting Pepper on the phone since me talking doesn't seem to affect you."

Clint groaned stepping to up to where he hid his keys, his phone between his shoulder and ear as Pepper talked him into meeting up with an associate of theirs who would be the perfect match for him.

Clint finally agreed and was able to hang up the phone. He shook his head with a chuckle realizing that he's been played by Pepper Potts, no wonder Stark married her.

Clint sat in the custom made leather seats and ran a hand through the dashboard. This was his baby.

"Miss you," he whispered to the car, a wistful smile on his face. Clint took a whiff expecting that new car smell to fill his senses.

Instead, it was distinct smell of carbon monoxide that he welcomed into his lungs.

A week after deployment and their mission was done. A success at taking down one of the smaller Hydra bases that had sprouted around Eastern Europe.

"Natalia," Bucky called out to her, touching her hand wanting a response. Natasha looked up at Bucky with a questioning look on her face. "We should celebrate."

"You can celebrate once you get back," Natasha replied shaking his hand off and going through the post-op checklist that they had ensuring that all finger prints and hair samples were out of the room. That Natasha Romanoff and Bucky Barnes would leave no traces in the room.

"_We_ can celebrate. Siberia is only an hour away by car."

"The extraction team is -"

Bucky cut Natasha off by placing his arms around her waist. His voice switched to a lower octave, one that he used when speaking Russian. "Do you remember, Natalia? The months we spent in Siberia? Training, killing, and making love on every surface we could get ourselves on... we can go back and relive them, Natalia."

Natasha looked in the mirror, at their reflections. "I do."

"Then we can celebrate there, only for a few days," Bucky stated his grip around her waist tightening. "You should call Fury. Tell him so; tell him it's a test of some sort. To see if bringing me there would show my loyalty."

"I'll... "Natasha stumbled in her words her gaze leaving his on the mirror. "I'll see what I can do."

Natasha and Bucky would spend the rest of the week that they were scheduled to still be on a mission in Siberia locked up in a cottage getting to know each other again.

Clint would spend his in a hospital room fighting for his life.

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Reviews please?

Comments and Criticisms, welcome!


	5. Suspicion

**Thank you so much for all the reviews, follows and favs for the story! **

Mistakes on this are all mine. See Chapter 1 for disclaimer.

Happy reading!

* * *

Chapter 5

When Natasha returned to the Tower after two weeks of being gone on missions, with Bucky at her side, the team barely acknowledged her presence. She didn't count it off as strange until even Thor who usually welcomed her with a bone crushing hug simply greeted curiously with a "Welcome Lady Natasha" and moved on to wherever it was he was going.

"Welcome back Miss Romanoff, Mister Barnes," Jarvis greeted them as they got onto Natasha's floor and dropped her stuff of.

"Jarvis, where is everyone?" Natasha asked. It was tradition that after a mission, they would gather in the living room and spend time together as a team. It was a tradition that she and Clint had started when they first joined the team. She had walked through the common level thinking that there would be people there to welcome her, but nobody was in sight.

"Mr. Rogers is in Florida visiting Ms. Carter," Jarvis replied.

Bucky nodded his head with a small smirk remembering the petite brunette that had captivated his old friend's heart. He sat down on the couch and took the remote flipping through the channels.

"Natalia, why don't you sit down here?"

Natasha ignored his request and went about her way into the kitchen to make herself some tea. She could tell something was off; the AI was never this secretive about anything. "And everyone else, Jarvis?"

"Mister Odinson had just left in order to join the others at an undisclosed location for an undisclosed reason."

"What aren't you telling me, Jarvis?" Natasha asked getting angry at the AI. She could feel her gut turn, she hoped nothing was wrong with the team.

"Natalia," Bucky called out from the living room. "Just come here and relax. I'm sure if your team needed you, they would call."

"Jarvis, what is going on?"

"I'm afraid that I don't actually know, Miss Romanoff. I just know that they have all left the building and frequently haven't been here for the past two weeks."

Natasha sighed shaking her head as she walked into her living room and took a seat next to Bucky. "Do you really think that they would call if they needed me?"

"You think they would be able to do anything without the Widow?" Bucky questioned her with a smirk, nudging her to come closer to him. "They're nothing without you, Natalia."

Natasha nodded her head snuggling into Bucky's embrace thinking of the where abouts of her teammates.

They were at Clint's hospital room.

It was carbon monoxide poisoning, easily could be an accident from one of the pipes that ran through his garage, or his car. Easily, but the Avengers, Tony especially, didn't believe in such coincidences until they were proven to him straight away that they were coincidences and nothing more.

When Tony had found Clint two hours after their phone call barely alive inside of his car, he panicked. Clint was having convulsions, after a small prick of his blood; Jarvis gave Clint two hours to live if untreated with the poison. Tony took the Iron Man suit and placed Clint in one flying them both onto the Hellicarrier. The suit helped him keep tabs on Clint's vitals. Helped ensure that Clint was alive.

It was after that, that he disabled Jarvis and erased all of Jarvis' knowledge on what had happened to Clint. There were very few people who knew of the man's garage where he kept his restored vehicles.

There were actually only three people.

Romanoff, Stark and Banner. Since Banner and himself were out of the question, Stark had to tentatively place the blame on the third person who knew of the place. Though if asked a year ago, he would never place such blame on the Russian who seemed to want to protect Clint more than herself. Things were different now.

"Why do you think the Widow has never come to visit?" Thor asked Tony. "I had witnessed her arrival at the Tower a mere week ago."

Clint groaned, "She's resting. She needs her rest after missions."

"Why aren't you caring about this more?"

"What are you talking about, Tony?"

"The fact that she just dumped you like a rat and ran to Terminator."

"There are no feelings there," Clint lied through his teeth though he knew Tony already knew that. "And don't even think about investigating this... whatever it is. Pipes burst all the time, that's why people get those monoxide alarm things. Probably should invest in one now."

Tony glared at Clint.

"This is not her fault, Tony," Clint replied to his glare. "She wouldn't poison me, she would just use one of the million ways she knows how to kill me quickly. This was an accident. If it makes you feel any better, I'll look through the pipes while I find a new garage to put my babies in."

"I do not understand the reference of Clinton's cars to his offspring," Thor noted in the background.

Bruce walked in the door with Clint's chart in his hands.

"Gimme some good news, Doc."

"Well, good news is that you can be released as early as this afternoon," Bruce stated placing the chart at the table near Clint's bed and checking the machines that took his vitals.

"And? Is there bad news?" Clint asked Bruce.

"Well you are out of commission for the next month while you ride out the rest of the symptoms from the drugs we pumped you with. SHIELD is giving you time to train and get back to your top form before you can go out there."

Clint nodded his head. "Princess will be locked in the Tower, roger that."

"Already took care of your release forms, as soon as this last drip is out, Fury's authorized for us to take a Quinjet back to the Tower."

Clint nodded his head turning to Thor who wanted to ask him about offsprings and cars some more in order to clear up some confusion.

Tony turned to Bruce, "did you test it?"

"I did."

"What did it turn out to be?"

"It's nothing that comes from pipes or cars. The carbon monoxide was only 30 percent CO and the rest of it was a synthetic gas made somewhat like anesthetics and another... more poisonous combination that even SHIELD isn't aware of yet. The gas was injected into the specific vent that ran down Clint's garage. I had it tested on a live specimen and within four hours the specimen was dead."

"Right," Tony said taking his phone out of his pocket and typing away on it. "I have a feeling I know what's going on."

Bruce nodded his head in agreement. "Sadly, I think I do too."

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Any of you guys have any idea what's happening?! :D

Comments and Criticisms, welcome!


	6. Realization

**Thank you so much for all the reviews, follows and favs for the story! **

I hope you guys like this chapter, tons of Clintasha feels! (Finally right?) Those of you who think you know what's going on... well, you'll just have to wait and see right?

Mistakes on this are all mine. See Chapter 1 for disclaimer.

Happy reading!

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Chapter 6

Natasha Romanoff associated memories with feelings and contrary to popular belief, and the rumors around SHIELD, the Black Widow did have feelings.

Her feelings of joy was tied in with ballet, the only times in life when she stopped thinking and just let her body go.

Sadness was also tied in with ballet as it was ripped away from her by the Red Room.

_Do not get attached, little Natalia_.

Love was tied with memories of Bucky. The way that he held her, kissed her, made love to her. The way she missed him, wanted him, knew him.

"Natalia," Bucky's voice called her out from her thoughts as his robotic had stroked her back. "What are you thinking about?"

Natasha shook her head in embarrassment, much like she would have if she when she was fourteen. Before she was the Widow and was able to control her emotions.

"Come on, Natalia. Tell me."

"I was thinking of the mission in Argentina."

"Ah, where we killed fifty American agents," Bucky replied with a smile. "Took us what? Half an hour."

"Tops," Natasha said leaning into his embrace.

"You remember the Room, Natalia? The time where I was introduced to you as your trainer?"

"I do. I thought you were the most handsome man I had laid eyes on."

"Well you had only seen Ivan and those funny little boys running around with their tails between their legs in those times," Bucky pointed out staring at the patterns on the ceiling curiously. "Is it different now?"

He wondered if Natasha knew that those patterns had been what they used to sooth her before a reprogramming session.

"I've seen a million different men in the world, and what I thought then still stand."

"Really?"

"Yes."

"I thought that when we were at Budapest, when I was riding behind you on that God-awful motorcycle that was at least fifteen years older than me," Natasha stated. "And that time... we were in Hawaii, you got us leave and you looked at me with the sun behind you..."

Natasha felt Bucky's drip on her body tighten, his body tense.

She turned to meet his eyes, "That wasn't you, was it?"

Bucky shook his head. Natasha buried hers in the crook his neck embarrassed she couldn't get her memories between Bucky and a man who was nothing but her partner, apart.

Natasha was confused.

Those were two memories she held on dearly when she felt love.

"I'm sorry."

"You have nothing to apologize for, Natalia. It is a flaw in your programming."

Natasha nodded her head closing her eyes and willing herself to fall asleep. After two hours of lying there trying to figure out the mess that was her head, her feelings, she slowly slipped away from the bed and walked out of the room to clear her head.

She wandered around the building, stepping into the elevator without a destination.

Before she knew it, she was standing at Clint's floor.

"Natasha?" Clint asked, turning around from the table, surprised to see her. He thought that his mind was playing tricks on him. He hasn't seen her in about eight months and yet he could still sense her; know when she's around. "What's wrong?"

Natasha walked towards Clint and sat at the barstool where there was a divider that opened up to the kitchen. "I can't sleep."

Clint nodded walking over to the pot and pouring Natasha some tea. "Something bothering you?"

Natasha took a sip of the tea that Clint had given her surprised that he still remembered her favorite. He was the only one who could make tea the way she liked it, even she didn't know how and had always relied on Clint to be there when she wanted some tea.

She inhaled the aroma before taking sip.

"I don't know," Natasha admitted meeting Clint's green eyes. Clint nodded his head with a small smile, much like he had done in the past. She responded with a small smile on her own.

"I haven't seen you in a while."

"Yeah, it's been a while hasn't it?"

"Bucky working out for you?" Clint asked her getting a look from her that meant surprise and confusion. He realized where he had gone wrong there and back tracked. He didn't want to know about her and Bucky's personal lives as much as she didn't want to share it. "I meant, as a partner. I hear you guys doing well together."

"Keeping tabs on me, Barton?"

"You were my partner, Natasha. I want to make sure you're safe."

Natasha nodded pushing the mug away. "Do you remember Budapest? When we took that ancient motorcycle and -"

"And drove off into a gun fight and out of it, intact?" Clint smirked remembering those days. "I remember. You and I, we were like Batman and Robin."

"You were Robin."

Clint pouted playfully, "Just 'coz I was from a circus..."

For hours, the two assassins looked out into the city reminiscing about the highs and lows of their partnership. The pranks, the adventures, the way that Clint would find the weirdest thing to eat in every city and force Natasha to try it.

The sun was rising on New York City, it's streets a little more busier.

"I miss this, Clint," Natasha blurted out, turning to look at him. "I miss my best friend."

Clint placed his hands on top of hers and gave it a squeeze. "I'm still here whenever you need me, I promise."

Natasha smiled at him nodding her head. "And you never break promises."

"No, I never do," Clint returned her smile, his eyes wrinkling at the side.

Once upon a time, there was a Russian spy who wanted more out of life besides killing people who may or may not have deserved to die.

Once upon a time, there was an ex-carnie turned spy who promised her that there was another way. That there was always another way.

She shook his hand, taking him up on his promise for a better life.

_Love is for children, Natalia._

Young Natalia Romanova had loved James "Bucky" Barnes. The man who taught her a thousand ways to kill a man with only her body.

Natasha Romanoff fell in love with Clint Barton. The man who taught her that while she had kill thousands with only her body, that although her ledger was dripping red, it was never too late to right the wrongs and fix her life.

Clint draped his arm around Natasha's shoulders pulling her close. Natasha snuggled to him, shut her eyes and breathed him in.

* * *

So was I right? Did you guys like this chapter?

Comments and Criticisms, welcome!


	7. Revelation

**Thank you so much for all the reviews, follows and favs for the story! **

This update is for **somuchforu** because their birthday yesterday, and also because the **Giants are going to the World Series!**

Anyway, I hope you guys enjoy this chapter. I received a comment about the lengths of the chapters and how it should be longer, so this is my longest chapter. Ever.

Oh and also, Please **vote** on the **People's Choice Awards 2013** for** Clintasha** **Best On Screen Chemistry**. Yay.

Mistakes on this are all mine. See Chapter 1 for disclaimer.

Happy reading!

* * *

Chapter 7

Natasha Romanoff walked down to the common area kitchen after spending a long morning training in the gym with Clint. She was glad that after their talk, they were seeing each other more often. It took the loneliness and confusion away for her.

Tired and hungry, knowing that the fridge at the common area was always stocked up with food, she decided that it was where she would go. In her usual style, she walked up to the kitchen but paused at the doorway hearing the hushed tones of people. Tony's voice.

Something must have been wrong for Tony to be, for once, using his inside voice. Calculating her choices, she decided to stay hidden at the doorway and listen. She didn't like it when people kept secrets from her.

"Are you sure?" Banner asked Stark as they were huddled over on the kitchen counter with their StarkPads, Tony flipping through the slides.

"No," Stark replied sarcastically landing on one slide in his tablet and expanding it so Bruce could see. "I went down there and took some samples with Jarvis. He ran it in the network. It's the latest biochem weapon that's made to paralyze someone before they die."

"Why would it be in the garage?"

"You are anything but stupid, Banner."

"Without proof, we don't' really have anything, Tony," Bruce responded shaking his head at the chemical contents in front of him. He and Tony were still working on the

"You really need more proof that someone wanted Barton dead?" Tony asked Bruce his whispered voce rising. These people were the only family he had, and he'd be damned if he let anything happen to them.

"I'm sure Clint has had a lot of enemies in his lifetime," Bruce stated. "He used to be a hired marksman before this."

"You and I both know that there are only three living people besides Clint who has knowledge of where Clint keeps his cars," Tony stated. "I know you and I didn't do it. There's no motive."

"So you think automatically that it's Natasha" Bruce accused him.

Natasha shifted in her spot straining to hear more of their conversation, trying to process and store everything that she had just heard.

"Who else would try to kill him, without actually making it look like they killed him?" Tony asked him. "You're a genius. Those people that Barton made enemies with would be proud to put his head on a stick and parade it through the streets. His enemies would want people to know who finally killed the famous Hawkeye."

"But why would Natasha want to kill him?" Bruce asked him. "They've been partners for years."

"Were partners," Tony pointed out. "She's with Barnes now."

"That isn't motive, Stark."

"You're the one with the psychological degree here. you figure out what's changed with the two of them. Romanoff isn't acting the same. She comes back from her missions with Barnes with no care for how many causalities they leave in their wake. That isn't how she and Clint did it. They were a get in, get out, only kill those who deserve it."

"I understand where you're getting at Tony but..."

"Her ledger is dripping more now than when she started," Tony stated. "If the Council ordered her to kill Clint, you really think she would care?"

Bruce looked at Stark in the eye then behind him. There was a fait difference in way that the light was brought in from the hallway into the kitchen.

"Someone's listening into our conversation," Bruce type on Tony's keyboard.

Tony nodded his head in affirmation, typing a command onto the tablet to Jarvis to figure out who was out in the hallway and how long they have been there.

"Vital Scans: Natasha Romanoff. Duration: 10 minutes. Location: Floor 27. Eastern corridor."

Tony met Bruce's gaze on the screen.

"You might be right," Bruce responded typing it on the device.

Tony nodded before turning back to the device. "We need to figure out the hell is going on."

They both picked up their Stark tabs and moved out of the kitchen using the doors in the west corridor of the floor heading to the living room where she knew everyone was gathered.

Natasha walked in twenty minutes later, after sitting in the kitchen drinking four cups of tea and trying to process what she had just heard from Stark and Banner.

There was a time in SHIELD that nobody would dared cross her or Clint for fear that the other agent might take them and use them as target practice. There was a time when a recruit had thought that it would be a good idea to dare someone to take black widow spiders and line them inside of Natasha's room. To make the long story short, Clint was able to take the spiders out before Natasha was back from her mission and the recruit no longer had three fingers and a thumb from his shooting hand.

Since day one, when he had brought her back to HQ to talk to Fury about the possibilities of defection, she and Clint always had each other's back. Everyone knew that from the way they acted to the way that where one of them was, the other would be. She knew that since Bucky was back and she had rekindled her romance with her former mentor, that things have changed. While the talk on the rooftop certainly brought them back a little more to where they were before where they sparred or went out to dinner, it wasn't the same.

The redhead didn't find out about the hospitalization that her former partner had gone through while she was with Bucky on a vacation until she ran into him in the infirmary where they gave him the last dose of medicine that would get rid of all the long term effects that being exposed to carbon monoxide and various other gases would do to him. Clint had brushed it off as if it was nothing, made it sound to her like it was coincidence.

"Gas burst on top of the garage," he told her nonchalantly before going to his briefing room for a short mission.

She didn't think that things have changed that drastically for her to be accused, by people who were supposed to trust her, of attempted murder on her former partner. After all, she hadn't done anything.

Natasha forced herself to focus on the task at hand. It was Movie Night for the team and it was Clint's choice to pick the movie. She was surprised to hear the surround sound blasting the 007 theme as the night began. She sat at the back of the room, observing the people around her. She wasn't in much of a mood to socialize with her team knowing that in the back of their minds, they saw her as a threat.

Steve was back, he and Bucky were on the side playing a game of chess, apparently it had been something that they loved to do back in the day.

Bruce and Tony were sitting on the couch exchanging notes about science or what not as the fourth James Bond movie played in the large screen in the background. Clint was the only one engrossed in the movie, his hand in the bowl of popcorn, a can of soda by his feet.

She has come a long way from the little girl in the corner of the Red Room who forced herself to feel nothing as she killed the girls around her, followed instructions on killing, seducing and interrogating.

All because of that one man sitting on the couch, looking all of ten years old as he watched his favorite, second favorite after her he always used to say because she was his favorite, spy running around and shooting bad guys.

Since they had their talked almost a week ago where he promised that he would always be there for her, she made sure to spend more time with him. She did miss her best friend, the jokes they would make and the silent way that they communicated with each other. He, in turn would always be there when she called him asking him if he wanted to spar, or to go to the mall where they sat on one of the benches, back to back, just observing people.

It was like the old days.

Except it wasn't.

She remembered the way he would lead her in and out of doors, a small hand on her back while he held the door open for her showing some of the American mannerisms that she had learned to embrace. She remembered how he would let her reach over and steal the tomatoes that he would take out of his disgusting burgers and order bleu cheese for her to dip _his_ fries in because she refused to order something so fattening but secretly loved.

While they still went out to eat after an occasional sparring session, he would order burgers without tomatoes and forgo the fries. He would open the door for her but he wouldn't touch her anymore. There weren't any slight awkward hugs, hands on the small of her back, or the occasional brush of their hands. He made sure to keep his distance and it was starting to piss her off.

Even the way he smiled and looked at her was different.

She wondered now whether it was because even he suspected that she had done it. That she had wanted to kill him.

Natasha shook her head at that thought. Clint had made it a point to always be honest with her, even when it hurt. If he thought that she was out there to kill him, he would have made a comment about it already.

"Hey Red! Why don't you come join us and watch the movie?" Stark called out to her from the giant black leather couch he was sitting at. Pepper had finally come down from their penthouse after having an online conference with shareholders or something and was snuggled in Stark's arms.

Bruce was on the Lazy Boy, his notebook is his hand, occasionally looking up when he heard gun fight in from the extremely large surround sound.

"Yeah Natasha! You know you secretly love double-oh-seven!" Clint exclaimed smiling at her then turning back to the big screen.

Natasha stood up and took a place on the other extension of the couch away from Tony and Pepper and beside Clint, reaching over to the bowl of popcorn that he had and stealing some.

Natasha saw Bucky and Steve from the corner of her eye almost finishing the game and Bucky tensing up as soon as he saw how close she was to Clint. She knew that Bucky had issues with the archer, if only about who she _belonged_ to as he phrased it. Clint was none the wiser, he was still his out-going type B self who had no care in the world.

"Natalia, make room for me," Bucky ordered her in Russian while he stood up from his defeated chess game.

Clint glanced at Bucky then Natasha and stood up, moving to the Lazy Boy, parallel to where Bruce was sitting and resumed watching the movie.

Bucky turned to Clint, "you speak Russian."

Clint barely nodded his head as he turned his attention back to the movie.

Bucky settled in next to Natasha, placing his arms around her while and Steve sat a small distance away from his childhood friend, turning his attention to the screen.

It wasn't an hour later when the elevator dinged open and a blonde woman stepped out. Natasha's body instantly went on attack mode as did Bucky's. Everyone else glanced at the elevator and turned back to the fifth James Bond movie, this time critiquing what the spy was doing and whether it would be scientifically accurate for a car to be able to jump from one side of the bridge to another or not.

Natasha didn't take her eyes off the stranger who had just invaded the room and was curious as to why nobody even said a word when she got there. She saw as the blonde surveyed the room and walked towards them, finding her destination.

Clint shift in the Lazy Boy and the woman plop herself down, half on top of the archer, half on the chair taking the bowl of popcorn into her arms while Clint wrapped his arms around her, his hands ending up at the popcorn.

The blonde looked back at Clint with a smile which he returned, she took a handful of popcorn and stuffed in his mouth with a giggle. He shot her a glare, whispered in her ear and they back to back to watching the movie.

Natasha felt Bucky's arms tighten around her, his mouth brushing against her ear.

"You want me to kill her, Natalia?"

Natasha shook her head and used her peripheral vision to observe Clint once again.

He was looking at this stranger the way he used to look at her, smiling the smile that he never gave anyone but her.

"Watch the movie, Natalia."

Bucky's whispered in her ear once again.

She nodded her head and melted into his embrace.

She would deal with her feelings later.

Bruce looked up at Tony who had messaged him to meet them in the kitchen

"It took a while since they just switched security companies," Tony started flipping his StarkPad over to Bruce. "This is the surveillance video from Clint's garage. I forgot that I had installed the place with infrared since Clint made me promise that I wouldn't put cameras in there."

Bruce nodded his head watching the surveillance video.

"Upper left corner," Tony motioned. "That's the vent that was compromised."

The metal in the vents weren't enough to shield the person who was in the vent from being detected by the camera. When the person stepped out of the vent and into the garage it was obvious from the body language that it wasn't a man, but a woman.

It was the Black Widow.

* * *

UHOH! Who saw that coming?!

Let me know what you guys think!

Comments and Criticisms, welcome!


	8. Webs

**Thank you so much for all the reviews, follows and favs for the story! **

I usually have time to reply to people's reviews, I'm sorry I didn't do it last time. I had to do three papers in one day (what I get for being a History major). Cross fingers and hope I did well.

And if the Giants beat the Tigers tonight, I'll see about posting the next chapter!

Mistakes on this are all mine. See Chapter 1 for disclaimer.

Happy reading!

* * *

Chapter 8

As it turns out, Natasha would get her wish to spend more time with Clint. SHIELD had received intel about an underground former KGB ring that was ran weapons through tunnels using the undestroyed remains of the Ho Chi Mihn trails that the North Vietnamese used against the Americans during the Vietnam War.

Clint was usually given preference in intel gathering and long range killing assignments. He was the SHEILD operative who had the most experience and patience with that kind of operation. Even Natasha didn't have his talent of being content on top of a tree or a building for days on end to observe the enemy.

Since Clint still had not been reassigned with a partner, mostly because a lot of the senior agents were busy in long term undercover ops in order to gain the upper hand and intel with Iran and North Korea. Also because he didn't want a new partner, not yet.

The operation that they were assigned required back up and a partner, therefore, as Clint's former partner and the former Strike Team Delta, Natasha was ordered to leave Bucky and join Clint to the jungles of Vietnam for surveillance and reconnaissance; further instructions would be later given whether or not they were supposed to infiltrate.

It was a short term mission that they anticipated would last no longer than a month.

Steve Rogers could not believe his luck.

It was one thing to be chosen to become Captain America, the ultimate icon who embodied the courage, integrity and selflessness that the military stood for. Another thing to be alive and well enough that he was able to still stand for those things almost eighty years later. Another thing that his childhood best friend, the person who saved him when he was attacked in allies, the one who taught him the ropes and stood by him as he wreaked havoc on the enemy was alive.

"You know," Steve started looking over at his friend who was currently sitting next to him watching the Yankees play in Ebbets Field. "I don't think I ever told you that I'm glad you came back."

Bucky nodded his head munching on the caramelized popcorn that he had purchased from the vendor and washing it down with stadium beer.

"Glad I did too," Bucky replied cheering with the fans as the Yankees batter hit a ground ball and the guy who was in second base was able to go to third.

Bucky looked down at his cup, realizing that he had drank all of the beer he had recently purchased. He looked at Steve's cup which was also empty. "You want a refill?"

"Problem with us and this serum," Steve stated a small smile, "we can't even get drunk."

Steve handed Bucky his empty cup. Bucky stood up and headed for the vendors. He was back a record of eight minutes later considering how the lines must have been. Steve didn't question it, shrugging as he took a sip of the beer and let the cool liquid flow down his throat.

Bucky watched Steve take each sip, his smile getting bigger as the man finished the cup of beer before returning his attention to the game.

Bottom of the ninth.

"Don't know what they put in that beer," Steve commented. "Finally feeling it hit."

Bucky shrugged covering up the smile on his face as he raised his cup to his lips.

They have set up camp for the night, concealed within trees and bushes and plants all around them. It was the perfect spot, especially because it had been created by burrowing animals who used it as a feeding hole. Clint had set up rope traps in order to catch whatever it is so that they could have them for breakfast and possibly dinner for the next day. No sense in wasting the MREs that they were provided if they didn't have to use them.

It was their fourth day since drop off and Natasha was getting antsy. Ever since that afternoon, seeing Clint's new girlfriend, she hadn't been herself and Bucky had happily pointed that out to her. He offered her old ways of reprogramming, offered to blurt her trigger word that would erase her emotions for someone but she refused. She was going to deal with it on her own, no more reprogramming.

"Natasha," Clint whispered to her, keeping his voice low amongst the thousands of creatures around them.

"Yeah, Clint?" Natasha replied, turning her body in the direction she knew he was sleeping at.

"I was just - never mind, Natasha," Clint stopped hesitating. "You should go back to sleep."

Natasha stayed where she was. "Clint?"

"Natasha?"

"What's her name?" Natasha asked him, her voice betraying some of the hesitation and embarrassment that she was usually able to conceal.

Clint hesitated on asking who she meant to draw it out of her, but he gave up with a sigh. "Her name is Natalie. I know weird coincidence - she likes to be called Nat."

Natasha nodded her head in the darkness. "That's why you don't call me Nat, anymore. It's Natasha all the time now."

"Yeah," Clint responded not knowing how to answer. " I just didn't want to... confuse you two. You're two very different people."

"What does she do?"

"She uh," Clint paused. "She's a kindergarten teacher at one of the private schools in the city. I uh, I went to visit her at work once, she's great with them."

_Good with children_, check.

"Does she... does she know what you do?"

"She didn't. Not at first," Clint responded. "I wanted to wait and see if things would progress, you know, I haven't had any luck in love... She... She thinks it's great. She wanted to tell her kids that I'm Hawkeye. Apparently since the whole saving New York things, we're all a pretty big deal. I told her she couldn't though, with the whole security thing. She understood."

_Accepts him for who he is, _check.

"Do you - Does she make you happy?"

Clint turned to face Natasha, a soft smile lighting up his face. It was the smile that used to be directed at her, the smile she knew that he had on his face when he would think about her.

"I don't think I've ever been this happy. She's... awesome."

_"Awesome,"_ check.

Natasha sighed looking up at the trees above her, dew coming down from the leaves and hitting her in the face.

"She seems like a great person," Natasha stated, she shut her eyes letting her question fall out of her mouth.

A million thoughts ran into Natasha's mind as she watched the stars and the silence of nature filled her ears. She didn't know why he agreed on a mission with her again. Didn't know if he thought, just like the other Avengers did (or at least Banner and Stark) that she was the one who poisoned him and left him to die. Or the reason what he saw in her when he promised her a second chance at life, a chance to redeem herself and right her wrongs.

Most importantly, she wondered if she ever made him happy even once.

He was the one who was always giving in their relationship. He was there for her when she needed him to, and even when she didn't know she needed him. He cheered her up after a bad mission that reminded her too much of what the Room had done to her and took her out to experience life as a person. Not a spy, not under the guise of someone else, but just as Natasha Romanoff with the wind in her hair as Clint raced down Highway 5.

She had never known genuine happiness before then. Never knew who she really was.

Natasha's thoughts were interrupted by a telltale whistle of an aircraft doing a low fly by and another distance whoosh of an RPG flying past them.

The RPG exploded a click from where they were staying, lighting up the area around them. Natasha could feel the heat from the fire that was ignited by the missile.

"They hit the trap camp that we set up," Natasha said whispering as she gathered his things and placed it back in her ruck.

"Leave the ruck here," Clint stated, pulling his vest on, his gear already packed and ready to go. "Bring what we need to. We have to low crawl through the shaded terrain to the west, hopefully that will be enough to conceal us at these hours."

Natasha nodded, hoping against all hope they weren't getting tracked by infrared.

"Clint?"

"Yeah?"

"I just wanted to let you know that I'm happy for you," Natasha stated.

"Means a lot. I'm happy for you too, Natasha. "Clint said as he secured his weapon. He gestured to the ground before him. "After you."

"Santa, this is Rudolph. Over."

"Rudolph, this is Santa. Go ahead."

"Attach on North Pole. Polar Bears in area. Permission to proceed delivering gifts. Over."

The communications agent sighed, as much as he loved working coms for Barton and Romanoff's missions. It almost always ended up in disaster. Sometimes he wished they would just be like every other agent and have a smooth mission. He looked up at Hill getting her attention.

"Ma'am."

"Yes agent?"

"Agent Romanoff and Barton have been attacked with an RPG missile. They are safe an requesting permission to continue with the mission."

"Permission granted. I'll call the Avengers for back up."

The agent sighed and got back onto the system. "Rudolph, this is Santa. Over."

"Copy Santa."

"Permission granted."

"Roger."

Bucky brought home a stumbling Steve Rogers, his arms the only thing holding the man up.

"You feeling okay there buddy?" Stark asked Steve as he saw the two men walking in.

"He doesn't look so good," Bruce noting the pale face that his friend was sporting. "What happened?"

"It's nothing," Bucky brushed them off. "He's just a little buzzed. Hasn't been buzzed since the forties so..."

Bruce and Tony shot each other a knowing look promising to check on their teammate when Bucky leaves his side.

"Right," Tony nodded.

"I'll just take him to his room to sleep it off. He'll be _good as new_ when he wakes up."

Bucky dragged Steve to the hallway where his room was. Being team lead, Steve had not wanted to get his own floor like the others did. Instead his room was in the common floor of the Tower.

Like a good soldier, Steve slept on a bed with tucked hospital corners and simple bedding. He didn't have much in the room, but there was a case of old - _vintage_ - Captain America trading cards he signed and framed on the wall above the oak book shelf which housed about a hundred history books from top to bottom that Steve had read to fill him in the progression to the new century. On the small bedside table, there was a framed picture of he and Peggy in that base in Germany where Bucky had been stationed.

Bucky placed Steve on the bed haphazardly. Steve sported a boyish and goofy smile on his face that, if Bucky Barnes had not been the Winter Soldier, would have made him laugh.

"You were a good wingman," Bucky muttered to Steve. "Before you let me die."

Bucky turned and walked to the elevator going to Natasha's floor. There he grabbed the two bags he had packed filled with his belongings and hers.

He walked back into the elevator and walked into the helicopter on the rooftop before pressing the kill switch for the bomb he had placed on Natasha's floor.

Maria turned to the tower and went up to Fury. "Sir, we need to get the Avengers on the line. Barton and Romanoff had a close RPG attack."

Fury nodded mumbling under his breath something about how those two never have a normal mission.

"Fury! Just the man we've been trying to reach!" Stark greeted him with sarcasm in his voice. Fury could hear the chaos in the background.

"What's going on, Stark?"

"Rogers is dying. The serum that he was injected with to make him Captain America just suddenly degenerated."

"What the hell, Stark?"

Bruce walked into the room. "We can't find him."

Fury's eyebrow raised up. "Can't find who, Banner?"

"Bucky Barnes. The Winter Soldier, he's gone," Stark answered him annoyed.

"Someone also blew up Natasha's floor," Bruce commented.

"it's a good thing I retrofitted her floor and Legolas for medium strength explosions," Stark noted rolling his eyes. "Avengers Tower is still secure."

"Good," Fury nodded his head. "You all need to stay there and defuse the situation with Rogers. I will take care of Barnes."

Maria who had been standing behind Fury as they patched the phone call through looked at him with alarm on her face.

"Sir? What do we do now?" Maria asked Fury.

"Switch up to security Delta. This ship is on lockdown."

"Fury we're coming there. There's something you should know."

"What do you want Stark?"

"Tony, don't!" Fury heard Banner exclaim from the background followed by muffled voices in heated argument.

"Romanoff was the one who poisoned Barton in his garage."

Maria looked at Fury with alarm on her face as Fury hung up the phone.

"They're alone in the jungle, sir."

Agents all around them scrambled to their code Delta jobs. Hill turned to Fury in the middle of the chaos that was the command center.

"I know."

"Should we get the Avengers to rescue Barton?" Hill asked. "If Romanoff really is the one and she's been working with Barnes..."

Fury shook his head. "Romanoff won't kill Barton."

"How can you be so sure, sir?"

"Call it a gut feeling."

Maria nodded her head before turning to the other agents who were waiting for her instruction. There were only so many times when Fury's gut was wrong.

She wished this wasn't one of them.

* * *

I know, please don't kill me!

Let me know what you guys think!I'm still working on the final chapter for this fic so I'd love some comments about that too!

Comments and Criticisms, welcome!


	9. Truths

**Thank you so much for all the reviews, follows and favs for the story! **

Sorry for the delay. I did the edits and revisions for this chapter and I didn't save it... Rookie mistake, I know. Anyway I hope you guys like this chapter, I'm sorry in advanced for the mistakes. Three more chapters to go!

Mistakes on this are all mine. See Chapter 1 for disclaimer.

Happy reading!

* * *

Chapter 9

Fury was, for the lack of a better word, furious.

He couldn't imagine what had happened to protocol, to the extensive background checks and tests upon tests upon tests that was conducted on the rare account that an enemy chose to defect.

The fact that James "Bucky" Barnes aka Winter Soldier had managed to pass every single test and fool every single person in the company told him that protocol and extensive background checks, lie detector tests and the works was not enough to stop infiltration to his precious organization.

He should have trusted Barton, when Barton had gone up to him at the start of this whole thing and voiced his concerns. He was suspicious to the Winter Soldier's request to defect, dropping into headquarters out of nowhere and asking for a new beginning. From Barton's experience people who were that good at their job didn't just defect without a good reason. Romanoff had taught him that.

Fury had brushed Barton's concerns off, although backed by Coulson. It had more to do with the fact that Fury was convinced that Barton's feelings towards the man was fueled by his emotional attachment to his former partner.

He should have trusted Barton, but for a while it as though the Winter Soldier had successfully defected working missions for them that killed many of the operatives that the Winter Soldier had recently worked with. Recent events show that it wasn't the case; the Winter Soldier was as loyal to Mother Russia as ever.

To make things worse, Romanoff was being accused of intending to murder Barton who she was in Vietnam with, Rogers was slowly dying and the Winter Soldier was nowhere to be found. It was almost like the Loki incident, except with less aliens and more drama.

"Banner, did you find anything that pertains to the serum that Rogers was injected with?" Fury asked walking into the infriamy where Stark and Banner were busy with calculations and machines to try to save their friend's life.

"Tony is working on that right now, Director. He think he's found the cure and gave it to the Captain," Bruce replied walking towards Tony and putting a hand on the man's shoulders.

"Tony?" Bruce said knocking the man out of his concentration. Stark looked at Fury with a sigh.

"My dad had the data report from the original Super Soldier Serum encoded in his journal, he added some modifications that he thought would improve the next candidate but I held off on making them for Rogers," Tony stated running around the lab and analyzing the materials all around him. "The anti-bodies that he was injected with to kill the Super Soldier Serum he was originally injected with was created by the Soviets. It had their chemical encodings all over it."

"Do you need any help tracking the Winter Soldier?" Bruce asked Fury.

"When you find him, you give him to us," Tony stated meeting Fury's eye. "He has a lot to pay for, Romanoff too."

"We're taking care of Winter Soldier," Fury stated. What he meant was he was working on tracking where the man had hidden underground at. For a man who had a prosthetic, he was fairly good at blending in the crowd. "You two take care of this problem and get the Captain back to as close to 100 as he's going to get in the short term. We'll worry about long term later."

"I've already injected him with the modified serum. He has three hours with his metabolism to get this through and he should wakeup," Tony stated.

Fury nodded and turned to walk out of the room going back to the control center where they were tracking Romanoff and Barton's whereabouts in Vietnam.

He stared at the two flashing dots on the screen which indicated that the two were close to their destination.

"Hill," Fury called out behind him for his right hand.

"Sir?"

"I need you to get Strike Team Alpha from the Pacific HQ out for backup. Get a fucking medical airlift ready too. I have a feeling shit's about to go down on Barton and Romanoff."

Hill nodded, her stomach twisting. "On it, sir."

If there was one thing that Natasha hated to do, it was low crawling. Low crawling through the muddy jungles of Vietnam was even worse. The Red Room had trained her in snowy, mountainous terrains and had rarely sent her into a part of the globe where she would have to crawl through muddy jungles. Her expertise was seduction, interrogation and assassination. Crawling through mud was a soldier's job and Natasha was no soldier.

It wasn't until sunrise that Clint stopped crawling and motioned her to do as well, hiding behind a giant bush. Clint quickly shredded his muddy clothes before balling it up and burying it in the earth leaving no evidence that they were there. Natasha followed his lead, taking the clean pair of cameos that he handed her.

They approached the tunnel silently, ensuring that their feet wouldn't make a sound. Clint looked behind him at Natasha who was covering him, guns pointed and ready, their senses trained for any unnatural movement or sound in the surrounding. When they reached the entrance of the tunnel, Clint walked in while Natasha stayed outside for a moment scanning for threats before following suit.

Clint had his weapon at the ready as he approached the entrance of the tunnel. Ten feet into the dark abyss, he was greeted to by a dimly lit room where a man stood at the corner of the room, his back to Clint.

"Love is for children, Natalia," the man whispered in Russian. "You will remember now."

Before Clint could even blink, Natasha ran from behind him and into the lit room. The man who previously had his back turned to Clint faced him with a smirk on his face and Natasha behind him, gun trained on Clint.

"Bring him to me," Bucky spat in Russian. Natasha, soldier like, walked up to Clint and pinned both his arms behind his back and pushed him to Bucky. She then stood off to the side at attention awaiting instruction.

Bucky looked at Clint with devious smile on his face. He switched his language to English as he held the archer's chin to meet his eye. "I always hated you, Clinton Barton."

"Feeling's mutual," Clint muttered as a reply his eyes jumping from the stoic Natasha to Bucky.

"You took Russia's finest away from her. You are to blame for turning her into that... naive American who thought that her ledger could be wiped clean," Bucky spat at him throwing a punch with his normal hand. "Americans and their American Dream... I was an American too, once. Tell me, Barton. What was _your_ dream? Was Natalia your dream?"

"Fuck off," Clint replied earning a series of punches and kicks throughout his body.

"Natalia," Bucky said glancing behind him at the Black Widow, his speech in perfect Russian. "Hold him back for me."

"Natasha," Clint whispered to her seeing that look in her face that he hasn't seen since the early days he had brought her into SHIELD. That was the look she got when her brain would reprogram back into Natalia Romanov, the Black Widow, heartless in her killing. She really was the Soviet Union's perfect weapon.

Natasha's eyes refocused on Clint like it had so many times when she woke up in the middle of the night not knowing who she was. Clint felt hope surge through him.

"Fight it, Nat," Clint whispered as Natasha pulled him to face Bucky and received more kicks. Bucky took out his knife and let the blade glisten in the cheap yellow light.

"You, Barton. You don't know when to leave other's _possessions_ alone."

Bucky raised his hand up and stabbed Clint in the gut.

"You would think, with the poison I had Natalia injected into your garage you would learn to_ stay the fuck away_," Bucky hissed stabbing Clint with every word. Clint's gaze snapped to Natalia who was currently guarding the door.

Stark had warned him before they left for this mission to be careful because Natasha couldn't be trusted. Clint had brushed it off at first because Natasha would never hurt him, never betray his trust. It seemed he was a fool.

"Oh yes, Barton. Natalia was the one who poisoned you. When I took her to Berlin, I was able to reprogram her," Bucky smirked. "She was supposed to be permanently reprogramed, but what I didn't know was that you little fuckers messed with her head too. As soon as she saw you, when you called out for her when you were convulsing in that car... she reverted back to being Little Miss Natasha Romanoff."

Bucky had a disgusted look in his face as he stabbed at Clint a few more times, ensuring that the places he stabbed wouldn't cause Clint to instantly bleed out. He wanted the man to suffer.

Bucky smiled at Clint, stabbing him in the gut and digging the knife in. "Fixed that little problem though. She is Natalia now."

"Painful way to die," Bucky turned to Natasha. "Natalia, make him suffer."

Natasha nodded her head and twisted Clint's arm behind his back, tying it up onto a rope. He dragged his body to the wall where they had the old POW torture hooks when the Vietnamese used to take the hands of a POW and pull it up to dislocate both their shoulders in order to get them to talk, spill their deepest secrets.

Clint was a solider. He knew the Code of Conduct. He stayed silent.

Natasha pulled on the rope that in turn pulled on Clint's shoulder.

"Scream for me, Hawkeye," Natasha said as she tugged the rope harder watching Clint clench his jaw and grit his teeth in pain.

"Scream for me!" Natasha shouted as she tugged harder and a large pop was heard throughout the room, as Clint finally screamed in pain.

Natasha lowered the rope seeing Clint's body crumble before tugging on the rope once again to repeat the painful process of dislocating Clint's shoulder. She had done it four more times, taking pleasure in every scream, grunt and murmer that involuntarily came out of Clint.

Bucky walked over to Natasha with a smile of his face. He patted her cheek just as he did when he was training her in the Red Room. "That's enough. Hold him still for me, my pet."

Natasha nodded her head holding Clint's shaking body upright, forcing his weak body to hold his weight.

"In thirty minutes, this tunnel will be filled with KGB operatives who would _love_ to get their hands on you," Bucky stated taking the gun from his pocket, squeezing Clint with his mechanical hand making the archer choke. "I'm going to be nice to you since you treated_ my_ Natalia very well. For that, I will give you a quick death I don't think you deserve."

Bucky charged the gun.

Aimed.

Fired.

* * *

... and cliffhanger!

Let me know what you guys think!

Comments and Criticisms, welcome!


	10. Sacrifice

**Thank you so much for all the reviews, follows and favs for the story! **

Thought I should post this before you all kill me for leaving you like that. Plus **Giants won the World Series**! I hope you guys like this chapter, because I had fun writing it and beta-ing it. Ah. Ok, onward with the reading.

Mistakes on this are all mine. See Chapter 1 for disclaimer.

Happy reading!

* * *

Chapter 10

Clint Barton could count with one hand how many times he's had something good happen to him. One of them was learning how to shoot. One was joining SHIELD. Another was learning how to fly and the most important one was making a different call and saving Natasha.

So when one Clinton Barton closed his eyes, bracing himself for the end and thanking the deities for those small, yet amazing good things that happened in his life, he was amazed to find his eyes opening.

He wasn't dead.

That left him with on question; why. He couldn't imagine that the infamous Winter Solider couldn't take aim at point blank range. Couldn't imagine the shot was wide enough that he missed and if it was, why it wasn't corrected.

His questions were answered by a gun in his hand and a bleeding redhead at his foot.

Natasha had taken the bullet for him.

Steve Rogers had gone through a lot in his lifetime – his long yet, short lifetime – but sometimes it seemed like all he did was fight.

He fought in the streets of Brooklyn as he was bullied into giving up the lunch that his aunt had packed for him, the small amount of money that he had saved up in order to buy Terry, the girl who sat next to him a Valentine's Day present. He fought as he tried to defend the war to people in alley ways and movie theaters who didn't support the war.

Then he fought _for_ the war. Against the Germans, Hydra and the Red Skull.

He fought for Peggy whose intentions he could not tell because he was just a kid from Brooklyn and he didn't know how to talk to women. Beautiful, smart, strong women at that.

Then he fought to stay alive. His body shut down but kept the fight going as he was frozen in the ice. Always healing, always creating new cells in order to keep him alive.

He fought the memories. Those of the past that haunted him to the day.

He fought the Chitauri and Loki, and even Stark who got on his last nerves.

He fought for Bucky, and his new chance at life that people had been skeptical about.

And then he was fighting again, and this time it felt like he was drowning in air.

And then the fighting stopped, he grasped for air, sitting up at the SHIELD infirmary.

"You're ok, Cap," Bruce told him standing by a beeping machine with a clipboard in his hand. Steve looked up at Bruce with a confused look. "You've been out of it for almost a day. Somehow you were induced with a serum that contracted with the Super Soldier Serum and it made you weak – mortal."

Steve's eyes narrowed at him. "I'm not immortal."

"You almost are," Bruce noted placing the clipboard down. "Tony's working on tracing the chemicals that we found from your body. Each chemical has an imprint of where its origin lies… Tony is trying to figure it out for sure… even though we have our suspicions."

"Bucky. Bucky would know!"

"Winter Solider is nowhere to be found," Bruce stated carefully not wanting to step on the fragile emotions of the Captain who had just woken up from the dead.

"Is he in danger?" Rogers asked taking the wires in his arms out and standing up ready for action. Ready for another_ fight_.

"We uh," Bruce paused trying to formulate how to break it to the Captain that they think Bucky had been behind this whole thing. That the man who he thought had come back as his best friend was actually the cause of his almost death and was out on the run. That the man had managed to fool all of them into thinking that he had changed, _defected_ into a better person when he had not at all.

"Spit It out Bruce."

"There is sufficient evidence that makes us believe he's the reason why you're here and the reason why Barton was poisoned," Bruce started.

"No!" Steve shook his head in protests. "Bucky would never!"

"I'm sorry, Steve."

"He would never! He's a good man!"

Steve thrashed around his bed in distress for his old friend, to the verge of breaking the machines around him.

"I'm sorry."

Bruce came up to the IV that was still placed in Steve's arm and placed in a heavy sedative. Steve needed his rest. They needed time to figure out what was going on.

He looked up at Bucky who looked down at Natasha, then back up at Clint. It was obvious to Clint that the man who stood before him who perfectly calculated his every move had no idea what to do. He had not anticipated Natasha Romanoff, the Black Widow, jumping in front of a bullet meant for Hawkeye.

He never anticipated that Natasha Romanoff would take a bullet for anyone, but then again, he was thinking of Natalia Romanova. Bucky was sure that the woman who jumped in front of a bullet to save this man wasn't his Natalia. It was Clint's Natasha.

Clint did not need to think twice. Bucky had lowered his guard and it was Clint's time to put his up. Clint, with his dislocated shoulders slowly raised the gun and fired.

One shot between the eyes of the man out of time.

_For Natasha_.

A shot in the heart.

_For Steve._

Another bullet through the heart.

_For Me._

He looked at the dead body of the Winter Soldier, cherishing the kill for a split second; a feeling that he has not let himself have since his contracting days.

He knew that the man who was before him used to be one of the good guys. He helped take down Hydra with Steve, was even the man's best friend. But the man before him was no longer the man that Steve had told him stories about. He was reprogrammed and used by the Soviets for their bidding. Murder and killing changes a man, obviously it changed James Barnes.

A groan from the floor shook Clint out of his thoughts and onto the redhead who had jumped in front of a bullet to save his life.

"Natasha," Clint whispered raising her up to check for any other injuries besides the bullet that went through her rib cage. There were no exits on her back and he could hear a punctured lung hiss every slow breathe that she took. He was no doctor; he couldn't go in her punctured lung and take the bullet out that was dodged in there no matter how much he wanted to knowing that it was affecting her breathing.

Natasha's eyes were fluttering close. "Hey! C'mon Natasha. Open those eyes for me."

Clint reached for his radio that had fallen out of his cargo pocket during the ordeal with Bucky and called for an evacuation. He ran his hand through Natasha's hair recalling that it was something that soothed her when she was injured in times before and hoped that it would work then.

"ETA five minutes, Nat. They just have to land and get into the tunnel," He said putting pressure to her wound. He reached for the inside pocket of his vest and started to perform whatever first aid he could. "Stay with me, alright?"

Natasha closed her eyes and squeezed his hand.

"L-U-N-G-S"

She spelled out on his palm.

"I know, Tasha. I don't – they didn't cover this… I'll make sure they cover this at the next buddy care…" Clint sighed nodding his head. The bullet punctured her lungs and it was getting harder for her to breathe. "Breathe with me, Natasha."

Natasha made a motion to nod her head and tried to follow Clint's deep, timed breathes. He was breathing as if he was behind a scope, aimed and ready to kill.

Natasha looked at him as he tried to nurse her to health. He propped her up against him, the com device beside him always at reach in case he needed to call for help.

She took his palm to get his attention and started spelling out words.

"I-M-S-O-R-R-Y"

Clint shook his head. "There's nothing to be sorry for. Come on, don't' worry about that stuff now. Just try to keep breathing."

She fought with her eyes to keep open knowing that Clint would be more disappointed in her. With his hand still in hers, she slowly started to spell to him again.

"R-E-P-R-O-G-T-R-I-G-D-D-D-N-T-N-O"

Clint shook his head mentally calculating the ETA of the medical team that was supposed to come to their rescue. They had two more minutes.

"Don't' worry about it, Natasha." Clint said shaking his head. It wasn't her fault. None of it was. She was reprogrammed by the Winter Soldier, who at his command was able to bring the Black Widow out of her that she's worked so hard to repress. That was over and the important part was that she, Natasha Romanoff, was able to suppress the reprogramming. Enough to save his life.

He looked down at her and noticed her eyes slipping shut for longer amounts of time as she tried to fight away the fatigue.

"Natasha, stay with me here," Clint pleaded with her, brushing the hair away from her face so he could look at her in the eye.

She shook her head at him as best he could, flipping his palm out again.

"N-A-T"

Clint looked at her confused. He saw the tears form in her eyes, clouding her vision. She shut her eyes for a moment and opened them again, shaking her head a little.

"T-A-S-H-A"

"Okay, Tasha," Clint said staying silent and listening for her breathing. There was a his every time she breathed, a sign that air was leaking out of her lungs but if she's held on for five minutes, she would hold on for longer.

"Agent Barton?" a medic stepped in with SHEILD uniform on. "Confirm please."

"0-6-2-7-Alpha- India- Hotel-1-9-3"

The rest of the medical crew came in with a stretcher and carefully extracted Natasha away from his grasp. She twitched in protest as they placed an oxygen mask on her and did as much as they can in as little time while taking her out of the tunnel and into the SHIELD aircraft.

"We have about twenty minutes before that place is flooded with enemy operatives," Clint stated to the agent-in-charge next to him. "We need to get the backup team in there to apprehend whoever the hell is in charge. We need answers."

"Roger."

The agents turned away and started talking on his phone much like Coulson had. Clint shook his head at the memory and let himself be ushered by the medical team to the seat next to where Natasha was laying down.

"Sir, your shoulders seem to be dislocated," the young medic noted as Clint flinched under his touch. He shot the medic a 'you think?' look and turned his attention back at Natasha.

"We have to perform the surgery as soon as we're stable and airborne. If we jostle her, we might decrease her chances of being able to go back into the field and getting a full recovery."

Clint nodded his head. He took Natasha's hand and gave it a squeeze, prompting her to open her eyes.

"They're going to take you to surgery. I promise I'll be here when you wake up."

Natasha nodded her head at him taking her mask off.

"I love you," she whispered, her voice hoarse. It was barely audible, and if Clint hadn't known how to read lips, he would've dismissed her mumbling. But he couldn't. With her pupils dilated and out of focus, she had professed her love.

The doctor rolled his eyes at the agent and snapped her oxygen mask back on activating the anesthesia for her operation.

Clint watched Natasha's eyes roll back as she fell into a medically induced sleep.

"He loved you too," Clint muttered squeezing her hand one last time before letting himself get treated by the medical staff.

* * *

So now that everything has pretty much calmed down, and you all have answers to your questions of Natasha etc.

Let me know what you guys think! (Pretty please!)

Comments and Criticisms, welcome!


	11. Debreifing

**Thank you so much for all the reviews, follows and favs for the story! **

This is a filler chapter. The next chapter is the end, bum bum bum. I just wanted to give the story some calmness to get over the drama from the past few chapters. I promise your questions will be answered in either this chapter or the concluding chapter.

Also this chapter is dedicated to **IcarusOwl **who makes me laugh with reviews.

_fixed a wording issue, thanks Anon! (updated)_

Mistakes on this are all mine. See Chapter 1 for disclaimer.

Happy reading!

* * *

Chapter 11

Clint broke his promise to Natasha.

As soon as they landed on the carrier, he was shipped onto a million briefings and debriefings of what had happened, what would have happened and what was going to happen and what should have happened. The briefings span four to eight hours long for a whole two weeks.

Then there was the issue of completing their operation. Strike Team Charlie had taken over and completed the mission successfully. He was in charge of overseeing the interrogation of the leader of the group that was found in the tunnel and find their connection with the Winter Soldier and any future operations that they had.

He was busy, to say the least. He barely had time for some shut eye, never mind have the time to be able to see Natasha. He heard that she had woken up from her surgery via Pepper who had tried her best to get Fury to reschedule one of Clint's briefs in order to go to the infirmary and visit Natasha.

Pepper's plan had semi-worked. Clint was assigned to conduct Natasha's debrief and report any and all instances where she could still be the reprogrammed Natalia who helped Bucky. Like a good soldier, Clint nodded his head at the order and busied himself until Natasha was medically cleared for debrief.

In all honesty he was actually avoiding any and all interaction with her because of what she had said.

He never thought in his life he would hear (see) Natasha say those three words, but he did.

On the rare downtimes that he's given between briefings and overseeing operations, Clint would think about it. How she had looked him in the eye and told him that she loved him. Well, not _him_. She had admitted in that dingy one star motel in Hong Kong that she loved the Winter Solder. "Was a child for him" if Clint remembered her words correctly. He wasn't surprised that after all the man had done, she would still love him. Natasha was loyal. She may have defected to the United States but he knew that it was her flaw. Those she loved, she would love forever. Those rare friends she had made she would protect with her life.

Just as she protected him.

And he didn't even send her flowers.

There was a knock on his door, "Barton, Fury wants you at command center."

"Be right there."

Clint composed himself and followed the agent to Fury.

"Sir," Barton stated dropping the reporting formalities that usually existed. He figured with the past few weeks he's had, he's allowed to do so.

"Romanoff has regained 95 percent of her lung capacity. Her doctors are allowing her to be debriefed. "

"Yes, sir."

"I want this thorough, no bullshit or covering up for your partner. I need to know if she can still be trusted."

"Yes, sir. That it, sir?"

Fury turned his back and Clint took it as cue to go to the infirmary and get this debriefing over with. He didn't know how much Tony and the rest of the Avengers had told Natasha. Clint knew that the team all visited, that they tried to cheer her up and the first thing she wanted was to know what had happened. The second thing they wanted to know was where he was.

A part of him felt bad for not being there for her for the weeks where she had been hospitalized, but he rationalized it with work. He had work, and it wasn't like the bad guys were going to suddenly stop popping out of nowhere.

He stood at her door and steadied himself, taking a breath before knocking gently once. He was hoping that she wasn't asleep.

He knocked on the door again before opening it knowing that Natasha wouldn't tell anyone to willingly enter her room.

She turned her head when she sensed his presence.

"Hey," He greeted her with a small smile looking at the white chair next to her bed, silently asking permission to sit there. She nodded her head in approval then stared at the purple and yellow flowers that sat on her bedside.

Clint surveyed her room. Unlike all the other times where they found themselves in infirmary after a mission, and those were a lot of times in the past decade, there were get well soon cards, flowers and bears that were all around Natasha's room. Courtesy of the team, or at least Pepper, Jane, Darcy and Thor, he presumed.

Tony Stark would not be caught delivering flowers and get well cards if it was not for Pepper, or with a hidden motive behind it.

It was tradition, or at least it used to be, that whenever he would be in town and she found herself in the infirmary, he would bring her by white tulips; because roses were overrated and white was her favorite color. The flowers would sit on her bedside for as long as she was confined in the room and once the flowers would wilt, he would bring by new ones for her to be able to take to her quarters.

White was a symbol that every time she was there, she replaced the red in her ledger with white. He glanced once again at the yellow and purple combination of flowers with a sigh.

"Fury send you here?" Natasha asked him, her voice was rougher than he was used to but that was understandable since she hadn't been allowed to talk for the past few weeks.

"I have to debrief you," Clint said opening the notebook that he had brought with him and clicking his pen ready to write down what she says. He looked up at her hoping to meet her gaze but she wouldn't turn to look at him. "I don't know how much the team's told you..."

"They told me about Steve. What he did to Steve and how he almost died. How I almost killed you... They told me that he's dead... that SHEILD has the people who ordered him here to infiltrate," Natasha stated reading the events as though she was reading it in front of her.

She paused looking Clint in the eyes. "That all they wanted was to get me back."

Clint nodded. "Do you remember anything about that morning? What he said; what you did?"

Natasha tentatively nodded her head. "I don't remember being compromised. I don't remember what I did when I was programmed into... into myself. For whatever I did, I'm sorry Clint."

"He reprogrammed you, Natasha," Clint stated. "What you did when you weren't you, it wasn't your fault."

Those words were familiar. It was the words that Natasha had used late at night as Clint held onto her for his life dreaming of the blue, the tesseract, Loki's control over his mind and actions. Those nights lasted for months and Natasha did nothing but hold him and tell him that it wasn't his fault. That the body count wasn't his, it was Loki's. That his ledger wasn't irreversible.

"I know," Natasha replied flinching at him calling her name. "I should have known. He kept calling me Natalia. Like it was supposed to mean something, and I should've remembered that I was activated as the Black Widow when he said that love was for children. I went crazy after that, I just... I didn't realize it, I didn't think it mattered at the time. I'm sorry."

Clint wrote what she was saying down then glanced at her when she paused. "Was there anything else you could tell... I mean about the re-programming so that SHIELD can try to find a way to prevent it."

"The first time he said that to me, I went crazy. That's how they knew I was ready for larger operations like Alexei and then the killings started and they didn't stop and I just... How did you get it out of me?"

She finally met his gaze. Her voice was small, her gaze was tentative.

"I didn't, Natasha. You did it."

Natasha looked at him confused. "I don't know what you're talking about. I did it?"

"You saved my life," Clint stated putting the pen in his pocket. This was a conversation that didn't need to be recorded. This was between the two assassins. Friends. Partners, or whatever the hell they were. "You don't owe me a debt, not anymore. Not after that."

She leant back onto the pillows, her eyebrows curved together in confusion and thought. Natasha shook her head.

"It was you."

"What?"

"You called me 'Nat.' Nobody has ever called me that before you," Natasha admitted. "I…You were the one who made me think that I wasn't Natalia. I was Nat. I liked being Nat... So I..."

"You don't have to tell me, Natasha," Clint stated, shaking his head. "This isn't part of the debrief."

Natasha nodded her head and started at the flowers beside her. They were the wrong flower, the wrong color. She looked at the room around her. Everything felt wrong.

Clint had never sent her a card. A flower. He never came to visit with his American music to play to her and make her life.

If she really did save his life, why did everything feel wrong?

"Where is his body now?"

"We have it," Clint stated going back into business mode. "Fury is having people look over it; test and see what serums were used. Analyze his brain so SHIELD can see how the programmings happened and what it did to the brain... Normal stuff."

She nodded her head in understanding.

"Did I kill him?" Natasha asked him her voice was small. Clint shook his head standing up from his heat and tentatively wrapping his arms around the redhead.

"I did," Clint whispered. "I'm sorry, Natasha."

Clint held onto Natasha, giving her a tight squeeze. He wasn't sorry. Wasn't sorry that he killed a man who used Natasha, who wanted to own her like she was a possession and not a human being. He wasn't sorry that he killed the man who tried to kill Steve, no matter how short of a time he knew Steve; Bucky had been his best friend and Clint made a mental note to talk to Steve about what happened. Give the guy some peace.

He was sorry though, that he took Natasha's one chance of love away. For weeks he was haunted with her voice. Her declaration of love to the man who Clint had killed without second thought.

"I'm sorry, Natasha."

She held onto his arms and melted into his embrace. She could feel the brace on his shoulders that was placed in order to help him recover from his dislocations. Proof that she had hurt him, and yet he was still there trying to comfort her. Sheburied her face in his neck inhaling his scent.

That was her last thought when she fell asleep.

Clint slipped out from her embrace a few hours after Natasha had fallen asleep in his arms. He laid there for hours just cherishing the moment. She was alive, so was he; and at the end of the day that was all that really mattered to him.

All that should matter to him.

It didn't matter who it was that she really loved, she deserved peace and happiness in her life. Him being there as her friend gave her that. So Clint put aside his feelings; the ones of guilt for killing the love of her life. The one that wished _he_ was the love of her life. The one that hoped, somewhere deep inside, that it was him she was talking to when she told him that she loved him.

Clint looked back at her bedside table, the yellow and purple flowers. He vowed to replace them with white tulips. He vowed to stay her friend.

* * *

Like I said, filler chapter.

Let me know what you guys think! (Pretty please!)

And look out for the final chapter which should be up by the end of the week (if I don't get buried in work etc.)

Comments and Criticisms, welcome!


	12. Denouement

This is **the** **end. **Thank you for all the **reviews, follows and favs** for the story! I appreciated the feedback so much, especially since I'm at a learning curve for this whole writing thing and anything really got me to improve (hopefully).

This is the **longest** chapter I think I've ever posted. I think it's lacking something and if you guys have any suggestions, I'm open to re-writing parts of this to make it better.

I hope you guys enjoy reading it. I'm not sure if there's going to be an epilogue yet. I have exams lined up for the next two weeks. But I'll try (if you guys think it's necessary).

Mistakes on this are all mine. See Chapter 1 for disclaimer.

Happy reading!

* * *

Chapter 12

Natasha was going crazy being locked up in the tower on R&R. She hated not being able to go out and work out "light excises" they told her. While her lungs were almost completely healed, the doctors didn't want to risk anything. Which mean no sparring, no running... hell she wasn't even allowed to walk for more than a mile.

Her coping methods relied on either a long work out session or a couple of bottles of vodka until she was well and over what was bothering her.

Pepper had ensured that she was monitored by Jarvis and since she was still on meds, no alcohol was to be consumed while in the house. And yes, while she is one of the greatest assassins in the world and could kill a man with her pinky finger, she wasn't stupid enough to cross one Virginia "Pepper" Potts.

Speaking of Pepper, Natasha paused in her steps to go up on the rooftop. It was Sunday morning and the tradition in the team, like movie night, was to have breakfast every first Sunday of the month. The tradition started mostly because it was the one day that Pepper let herself have an actual day off of work when the rest of the days she would tell them that they're taking a break, when in reality she had a few webcam conferences to do, at least.

The elevator opened and Natasha stepped out to the busy clamor of the team in the dining area.

"Morning Natasha," Pepper greeted her as she walked into the dining room. She took her usual seat at the table with a smile on her face.

"Good morning Pepper," Natasha greeted.

"How are you feeling today?"

"I hate being stuck in here and not being able to do anything. I'm glad to be here though. But I should be asking you how you're feeling."

Pepper chuckled at that. She hasn't even told Tony for fear that something might happen, or that Tony would make a baby Iron Man suit, but she had to tell someone and since Natasha was the one who found her crying in the bathroom on the common floor that day with a pregnancy test with her hand, Pepper figured that the secret was out.

"I think... I think I might tell him today," Pepper told her. "Clint and I worked out a plan of how I'm going to tell Tony. I'm pretty excited."

"Clint knows?" Natasha asked surprised that Pepper would tell Clint. Besides, Clint hasn't been in the Tower in a while. He was still busy cleaning up the mess that she had made with the Winter Soldier. Once she was placed in therapy, which Clint had attended with her, in order to find the memories that Natalia - under the Winter Soldier's programming - had done, Clint had made it a point to undo all of what the man had set in plan.

One of them was to find the specialized explosives in every corner of the hellicarrier and any base which Natasha had been to in the year that the Winter Soldier had been back. It was a tedious job and last she heard, Clint had volunteered for it.

"He came back three days ago," Pepper informed Natasha with a slight frown. "He's cooking this morning's breakfast."

Natasha nodded, pushing the hurt in the back of her mind. She shouldn't be feeling like that. It didn't matter that she, in her crazed state, had told Clint that she loved him and he didn't respond. It didn't matter that he never even brought up the subject again even after he was done with his pseudo interrogation, brushed it off like she commonly said things like that. It didn't matter that it took her almost dying and the death of her first love that made her realize that she does love Clint. As an adult; knowing his imperfections and weaknesses, she loved him.

It didn't matter that he didn't love her back.

Or it shouldn't, but it did.

There was a loud noise, a glass shattering,

then shouting from the men in the living room that made her and Pepper raise their eyebrows looking at the direction where the noise had come from.

"Anthony Stark!" Pepper bellowed from her seat.

"It wasn't me!" Tony exclaimed from the living room.

"You better get over here, now, Tony."

"Red! You came out of your web!" Tony exclaimed walking into the room with a smile on his face heading straight for Pepper and dropping a kiss on her forehead.

Natasha watched as the two interacted. Where Pepper was berating Tony for doing something or another and Tony looking like a little boy as he apologized to Pepper. She watched as Pepper forgave Tony rolling her eyes as Tony promised to never _ever_ do it again, both knowing that he would.

She stood up from her seat and walked to the direction of her teammates to check the damage of whatever had happened, but also to get away from the two lovebirds who reminded her of what she _couldn't_ have.

"Lady Natasha!" Thor greeted her. He was back from Asgard for a few weeks because it was Jane's birthday. Since Earth days were exponentially faster than Asgardian days, he was able to spend more time on Earth than he had first anticipated without causing an uprising in Asgard.

"Hi Thor," Natasha greeted him with a smile.

"How are you healing?" Bruce asked Natasha. Like Tony had mentioned, she hadn't been out of her floor to see the others.

"Good," Natasha replied with a small smile.

Bruce's eyes focused on her. "How are you holding up?"

_Holding up_?

Her face must have shown her hint of confusion.

"I know what it is like to love someone so...unjust," Thor stated talking about Loki. "I am just happy my brother has chosen to seek help. I am sorry about your loss."

Natasha nodded her head, speechless. She hasn't even thought of Bucky in the last couple of days. The person who invaded her mind and made her want to go to the gym to punch the living daylight out of a punching bag was Clint Barton and his nonchalant attitude that he's taken with her.

Natasha met Steve's eyes from across the room. He's been quieter than usual since his resurrection to Captain America after Bucky had injected the anti-serum in his system.

"You doing alright Cap?"

"I'm gettin there," Steve answered her. "Thank you for asking."

Natasha stood there awkwardly as Thor went back into being mesmerized by the magical box, Steve went back to his Sudoku and Bruce went back to science. She contemplated going up to her room or the rooftop for a moment but she found herself in the kitchen door watching as Clint flipped the chocolate chip pancake - because the team would not let him make anything else - in tune with some 80s rock song. She leaned against the door to watch him move around the kitchen. He was a great cook, and looked right at home in any kitchen she had ever seen him in whether it was surrounded by old pots and pans in a small cottage in the woods or Starks' state of the art kitchen complete with every utensil and kitchen tool he could ever want.

Clint turned to the plate and placed the pancakes there when he noticed the red at the corner of his eye.

"Hey Natasha," Clint greeted her with a smile. "How have you been?"

"Good," Natasha replied curtly. "How was your mission?"

"Broke in my new partner," Clint stated, "it was good."

"New partner?"

"Well uhm, since you were assigned to be partners with the - since we weren't partners anymore, Hill got Bobbi to come back and be my partner."

_Oh, Bobbi. _

"That's... good," Natasha replied with a tight smile. Bobbi, as all of SHIELD knew, was Clint's wife at some point. The thought of them being partner together, working long hours of surveillance on the rooftops made Natasha's heart clench. Her chances with Clint were getting small and smaller. "How is Bobbi?"

"Bobbi's Bobbi," Clint replied evasively.

"Right uhm," Natasha mumbled. "Glad you're back."

Clint turned to face her as he dished out another pancake on the sixth plate. He always made enough for them to have six pancakes each. Clint looked at Natasha and sensed her sadness. "Natasha, I'm sorry."

Natasha turned around from the door to face him. She could feel the bile rising in her throat. "You don't have anything to apologize for, Clint. You don't feel that way for me, I'm learning to accept it."

Clint's eyebrows were knitted in confusion as he walked to her side putting down the spatula, wiping his hands on his apron that read "I'm the Boss... at least in the Kitchen." She had given him that apron once a long time ago.

"What are you talking about Natasha?" Clint asked as he approached her walking into her personal space.

"I... I told you that I..." Natasha paused taking in a shaky breath. She didn't want to have to say it again. She felt stupid enough for saying it the first time and now it was like he was cornering her to say it again.

"That _you_ loved _him_," Clint finished for her. "I don't know what you were getting at before, if you're talking about being my partner. It wasn't my decision to get Bobbi as my partner."

"Clint -"

"You knew that I had feelings for you. Before all of this started, before Barnes ever laid his sorry ass up here and found you again. I'm not sorry I killed him. I'm sorry I took your once chance at being happy away from you. If I could make it up to you somehow I would, but I'm not going to apologize for killing him. Not after what he had done to Steve. Not after what he had done to you."

Natasha shook her head. "When I was getting medevac'd... When I looked at you and I told you that I loved you... you think I was... what? Hallucinating?"

"I know you loved him, Natasha. You said so yourself when we were in Hong Kong," Clint replied. "I know you were talking to him before you passed out in 'Nam. You don't have to explain; I got it a long time ago. I just didn't want to acknowledge it, not until I had a choice."

Natasha shook her head, "I love _you_ Clint."

"No, Natasha," Clint protested shaking his head grabbing her face between his hands forcing her to look at him. "You don't love me. You don't get to do this, not when I'm almost out of your web. I refuse to get spun back in."

She looked at him bewildered. He thought she was just playing him? How could he think that after all they've been through and after her profession of love?

"Look, I'm grateful. For what you did when you jumped in front of that bullet for me. But you don't have to pretend, not with me," Clint stepped away from her and to the cooling pancakes. "You should probably go get the guys to the table. Breakfast is ready."

Natasha nodded at him before walking to the door.

"Clint?"

"Not now, Natasha," Clint stated. "We've said all we needed to. We should stop while we can still be friends."

The team was gathered at breakfast and enjoyed Clint's pancakes as they usually do with the assortment of syrups and toppings that Clint had cut up and placed on the table.

"Friend Clint," Thor started as he chewed on a folded up pancake. Natasha may not have eaten six pancakes but Thor takes the rest of the four skillet sized pancakes that she doesn't eat.

"Yeah, buddy?"

"Where is Lady Natalie? I have not seen her in a long time."

The attention of everyone at the table snapped to Clint. Until the mission with Natasha, each Avenger had seen Clint with his new blonde girlfriend frequently. Though they all knew that it was in part done to get back at Natasha, the team had thought that Clint was actually moving on.

"She's uh... we decided to go our separate ways," Clint stated stuffing a pancake in his mouth and reverting his attention elsewhere besides meeting his teammates eyes.

"That is unfortunate," Thor replied patting the smaller man on his shoulder. "Perhaps there is someone in the universe better suited for you."

The table's eyes snapped to Natasha who continued chewing on her pancake, trying to suppress the anger that bubbled in her. She knew that Thor didn't mean to single her out like that, but regardless of what he meant to do, the attention of the table was now on her and Clint.

"Nah, I'm gonna pass," Clint stated meeting Thor's eye and clapping his hand on the bigger man's shoulder before turning his attention to his pancake.

"You do not want to have a spouse? A family?" Thor questioned his friend. He was still trying to understand Midguardian society. In Asgard, it was required for people to be married and have a family. There were very little people who were an exception to that rule.

"Not in the cards for me, buddy."

"I wouldn't give up hope," Tony stated, the team not missing his side glance to Natasha. "I mean if I can get this beautiful woman to _finally_ admit her love for me, you can too - I mean who wouldn't fall for me thought."

Pepper rolled her eyes, "You're still not forgiven for breaking the vase."

"But moooom," Tony whined. And just like that, breakfast was all jabs and teasing not directed at the two assassins.

Natasha walked around the common area kitchen looking for something to do. It had become somewhat of a habit since being stuck at the Tower with nothing else to do. She learned how to bake, and although it was only Thor who ate whatever she produced out of the oven, it made her feel accomplished. She was getting better at cooking meals as well that the Avengers were letting her cook dinner the night after to demonstrate what she learned in her past time.

In reality, Natasha was just _trying_. She was trying to be the woman that she thought Clint deserved, the one he wanted. She always figured he would want someone to cook for him, an American who would laugh at his jokes and listen to the twang of country songs that she found irritating. She was trying anything to make herself feel better. But at the end of the day, it seemed that Clint wasn't paying attention to what she did.

"Hey Red! What you doin' up?" Tony Stark walked in the kitchen, Led Zepplin t-shirt and all.

"Should ask you the same thing," Natasha replied taking out a bowl, flour, eggs and sugar from the cupboard and placing it on the table. Tony just sat at the stool and watched. "I'm going to try this… 'Better than Sex' cake recipe I saw online the other day."

Tony chuckled. "You're turning into a regular Martha Stewart in the kitchen… except she actually knew how to cook. And besides, you not getting any, Red? I'm sure you can walk down the street and have your pickings. Men fall all over your feet."

Natasha shot him a glare before taking out the measuring cups and placing her Stark Pad on the stand to read the recipe. She started at the recipe longer than necessary trying to bottle in the emotions inside of her.

_You're getting weak, Natalia_. She heard Bucky's voice in her head. When did she become someone who _felt_ ashamed. Someone who can get a stranger in the street to fall in love with her, but once they knew her, the _real her_… Well.

Natasha shook her head from her thoughts and focused back on the eerily silent man before her.

"Pepper having late night cravings?"

Tony shot her a look and shook his head. "Thank God, no. I think it's too early for that."

"Too excited to sleep then?"

Tony nodded his head. "I'm gonna be a dad."

Natasha smiled at him. "You are. You scared you're gonna fuck it up, Stark?"

He shrugged before tentatively nodding his head. "I wanna be a better dad than my dad was. I mean really that's not setting the bar real high, but I wanna be there for him you know?"

It was her turn to shrug as she cracked a few eggs in the bowl. "I don't."

"Right, you never had parents, did you?"

"I must have, once."

"Is that why you don't know how to do the whole feelings thing?" Tony asked her, resting his chin against his hands. "I mean the last guy you loved was killed by the guy you _tried_ to kill… Man if I have a daughter, remind me to not let her grow up to be like you."

Natasha knew Tony didn't mean it offensively. That it was true, nobody should grow up like her. Forced to kill at age ten and taught a million different ways to kill, seduce and maim a person. It was true that she had a specific skill set that set her apart from the rest of the population, that the media had labeled "cool," but if given the choice, Natasha Romanoff would have wished to grow up like the rest of the world.

Maybe then she would have a chance.

He looked at her as if he was studying her. Like she was another experiment of his in the lab. It irked her.

"Why did you do it?" Tony asked her.

"Do what?"

"Poison the vent system in Clint's garage," he clarified watching her every move. She stalled as she hit the egg on the edge of the bowl before cracking it completely, shells and all inside the bowl. She slammed her hand against the counter, gathered the bowl and dumped the contents in the trash determined to start all over.

"C'mon, Red. Just between you and me," Tony badgered. "You hate him that much? Hate that he made you into this… human being with feelings? C'mon."

Natasha shook her head and muttered, "I didn't know."

"What?"

"When Bucky reprogrammed me, I have no recollection of what I did, or what I was doing," she replied. "Natalia Romanova's memories aren't stored where Natasha Romanoff's memories are stored. The Red Room they… I don't know. They did things and I didn't… I wouldn't kill Clint. I would _die_ before I would let anything happen to him."

"You love him," Tony stated simply. He was looking at Natasha like he figured out the secret that would explain and prove Quantum Physics – which the man probably has but refuses to share to the world.

"It doesn't matter," she replied, going back to the ritual of breaking the eggs into the bowl.

"That man is head over heels in love with you. It's not that complicated. You two should be together."

Natasha shook her head chuckling a little. For a genius, Stark could be so stupid. It was complicated. The thing with her and Clint. Complicated because they were partners, because he knew her inside out, because they both work for SHIELD and while there are ways around fraternization rules (agents can marry, not date each other), it still wasn't worth the risk. And _oh_, the one fact that complicated everything.

_He doesn't feel the same._

"It's not that simple."

"It is, only if you make it."

"What is with you and all this deep wisdom tonight?" she asked him. This Stark she could handle. He was mellower, understanding even. It was a refreshing change from the egotistic, masochist who she had worked for almost four years ago.

"I'm trying to practice being a dad," he replied shooting her a grin. "I figured, who better to practice on than the girl who never had parents. That way you don't really have high standards or expectations. Kids never know what great parenting is until they grow up, you know? When they start comparing their lives to the kids around them," Tony paused, a wistful look on his face that she didn't think she would ever see on him. "When those kids talk about their lives, their parents … I want my kid to have the best life. The best parents. Best _everything_. I know Pepper's gonna be the best mom. I just want to be the best dad."

Natasha smiled at him, turning to the bowl in front of her and whisking the contents together.

"As your pseudo –father of the night. I'm gonna give you fatherly advice."

She groaned.

"Tell him."

"Tell who, what?"

"Tell Barton you love him."

"He won't believe me."

"It doesn't matter," he stated. "Keep telling him until he does."

Natasha looked at him wearily. "How would you know?"

"I know why you started baking. Why you stocked up on Tim McGraw, Johnny Cash, AC/DC and Queen… I know why he broke up with Natalie – that blonde high school teacher. I _watched_ the footage from 'Nam. _I know_."

Tony stood up from his chair. "I gotta go down to the lab and grab something for Pep. Wish me luck… wait I won't need it. Woman's head over heels for me."

Natasha shook her head.

"I mean who wouldn't be?" he smirked as he left and headed towards the elevator.

It was past four in the morning when Natasha was able to gather her courage and decide which route to take in her life. She found Clint at the rooftop overlooking New York City.

"Hey, Natasha," Clint greeted her when he sensed her presence in the room. Regardless of how quiet her footfalls were, he always knew where she was.

Удачи!

_To both of us._

Natasha hesitated at the door before making up her mind and standing at the edge of the small square rooftop next to Clint.

Clint watched Natasha's face lit up by the New York City lights.

"I just wanted to let you know that I'm sorry about... that you think... whatever I made you think..." Natasha paused to gather her thoughts. She let out a breath before continuing. "I know you don't- won't- believe me, and you don't have to. I just wanted to set the record straight."

Clint started at her as she stopped talking and looked at the people below her.

"I love _you_," Natasha stated. "I know I was confused, and I know I've never showed it but I do."

Clint took her hand and pulled her down to sit next to him. She leaned against him, a position they were familiar with.

"I know I'm too late," Natasha whispered to her neck. "I just wanted to let you know, it's you. It's always been you. I've just been... I didn't know the difference, and when Bucky showed up I was just... I was confused. I get it now; I'm just… I'm sorry I'm too late. "

Clint looked down at her, lifting her face at level to his. He gave her a grin, the one she loved with a twinkle in his eyes.

Then Clint's lips touched hers, and it was as if the past few months - Bucky appearing, Vietnam, the reprogramming - didn't happen. That her past as Natalia Romanova, cold blooded killer, the greatest operative the Red Room has created was gone.

In that moment, Natasha felt like Natasha.

* * *

Thanks for reading! I hope you guys enjoyed the story!

Like I said, not sure if an epilogue is in store with my schedule for the next couple of weeks, but if you guys deem it necessary I'll try to squeeze in writing one!

Comments and Criticisms, welcome!


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